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IN MEMORIAM
WEBSTER L. SMALLEY
Dr. Webster L. Smalley (February 1921 - July 1996),
nationally recognized playwright and teacher of playwriting,
earned his B.A. degree from the University of Washington in 1946
and his M.A. degree from Columbia University in 1948, both in
the field of English. He received his Ph.D. degree in theatre/dramatic
literature from Stanford University in 1960. In New York City
Smalley served as head of the script department for the American
National Theatre and Academy (ANTA) and for the Experimental
Theatre.
He taught at the University of Missouri and Stanford
University before teaching at the University of Illinois, where
he headed the Playwrights' Workshop. In the workshop he directed
fifteen major productions and produced more than fifty new plays.
After fourteen years at the University of Illinois, Dr. Smalley
joined the faculty of the Department of Drama (now the Department
of Theatre and Dance) at The University of Texas at Austin in
1969.
At The University of Texas Dr. Smalley taught
both undergraduate and graduate courses in playwriting, introduction
to the theatre, dramatic writing for television and contemporary
British drama. During the summer of 1972, he served as a faculty
member of a study tour of British theatre, sponsored by Southern
Methodist University.
As a practicing playwright keenly interested in
developing new scripts, Dr. Smalley founded the E. P. Conkle
Workshop for Playwrights, which gave talented but little-known
playwrights the chance to evaluate and revise their scripts within
actual production circumstances. Dr. Smalley served seven years
as the administrative director of the Conkle Workshop, named
for his predecessor E. P. Conkle, the first teacher of playwriting
in the Department of Drama. The original workshop was funded
in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
Dr. Smalley served on numerous departmental, college
and University committees, such as the Executive Committee of
the Department, College Promotion and Tenure Committee, and the
Building Committee for the University Performing Arts Center,
1971-1974.
For three years (1972-1975) Dr. Smalley served
as chairman of the Department of Drama, and in 1983-1984 he was
appointed as the E. W. Doty Professor of Fine Arts. In 1980 he
began the Shoestring Theatre program, which produced over 200
undergraduate and graduate plays in the Laboratory Theatre on
a "shoestring budget."
In addition to his University work Smalley served
on various state, regional and national theatre committees, such
as: the Theatre Festival Subcommittee of the Arts for the Bicentennial
Committee (1975); Playwriting Committee of the Southwest Theatre
Association; and Standards Committee of the National Association
of Schools of Theatre.
He served as a Vice President and President (1984-1987)
of the National Association of Schools of Theatre (NAST), the
national accrediting association, which is comprised of administrators
from more than eighty theatre departments, fine arts deans and
other administrators.
Dr. Smalley was also active in the American Theatre
Association, the Speech Communication Association, the University
Resident Theatre Association and the National Theatre Conference.
He was an elected member of The Players in New York City.
His produced plays included Fragment (off-Broadway,
New York City, 1949); Taste of Violence, an epic play
about the assassination in 1893 of Elijah Lovejoy, an Illinois
minister-publisher; the award-winning The Man With the Oboe (1963),
a fantasy with music which was named play of the year (1963)
by the Southeastern Theatre Conference; and The Boy Who Talked
To Whales (1978), which was produced successfully throughout
the United States and in England. The British production of The
Boy Who Talked To Whales was performed at the Unicorn Theatre,
London's oldest and most respected professional theatre for children
and youth.
The Boy Who Talked To Whales was published
by Anchorage Press, New Orleans, and included in the anthology
of plays for young audiences entitled Theatre for Youth: Twelve
Plays with Mature Themes (University of Texas Press, 1986). Chang
Fu, the Witch of Moon Mountain, another play for children,
had a successful production in the Department of Theatre and
Dance and elsewhere.
Dr. Smalley's published works also include an
anthology entitled Five Plays by Langston Hughes. In 1963,
when Smalley collected the plays and wrote the essay for Five
Plays by Langston Hughes, none of Hughes' plays had been
published although all had been staged. Later Smalley wrote the
extensive biographical essay about Hughes for the Dictionary
of the Black Theatre, Broadway, Off-Broadway and Selected Harlem
Theatres, Allen Woll, editor. The African American poet,
author and playwright Langston Hughes once referred to Smalley
as "my genial editor."
Smalley was considered "a fine, caring gentleman" by
both faculty and students. Through his guidance many of his students
received honors and awards for their playwriting, such as Cheryl
Hawkins, the winner of the $5,000 Joseph Kesselring Award of
the National Arts Club, New York City, for her play Shattered
Home, which concerns "...relationships in a black family
whose members have trouble communicating with one another."
During the showcase production of the play in
New York, Hawkins was quoted in the press as saying that she
enrolled in the Department of Drama "...knowing nothing
and he (Smalley) taught me about craftsmanship. I can't help
being confident about my future now, but that is because of Dr.
Smalley who helped me open up.... No matter when I called him,
and I have called him at some crazy hours, Dr. Smalley has always
been ready to help. He has been a very special person to me."
Upon his retirement in 1989, after teaching at
The University of Texas at Austin for twenty years, Dr. Smalley
was named Professor Emeritus, and an endowed student scholarship
in playwriting was established in his name.
Professor Webster L. Smalley is survived by his
wife, Pernella, and three children, Jane Smalley Tuttle of Durham,
North Carolina; Cheryl Smalley of Seattle, Washington; and Tad
Smalley of Austin, Texas.
<signed>
Larry R. Faulkner, President
The University of Texas at Austin
<signed>
John R. Durbin, Secretary
General Faculty
This Memorial Resolution was prepared by a special
committee consisting of Professors Coleman A. Jennings (Chair),
David Nancarrow, and Gordon Peacock.
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